I wonder if you could help me introduce a new abbreviation into common useage? Every time I get to this phrase in an email or writing a card with family news I want to shorten it, for brevity. If I do so without explaining what it means people will have to ask, which is embarassing all round. Perhaps, I could do what the papers do, explain it the first time and then carry on using it until it becomes acceptable?

Its ‘at the moment’ (atm). It couldn’t be ATM because that is an automatic teller machine (in the US) – a cash machine this side of the pond. No, it would have to be atm. Things are good atm… I am happy atm… you get the idea.

I am a sucker for abbreviations. My husband looks at my ‘to do’ lists in amazement, wondering what SBYS could mean (Sainsbury’s). Even I have to think about it when I have written BST at the top of the page… no, its not a reminder that its British Summer Time, or even as Martin would have it, British Shorts Time – it’s a reminder to have Be Still Time. Well there’s no point wasting ink and effort writing 3 whole words, especially when there are things to get done!

Because of course we already do widely use ‘asap’. Things have to be done ASAP – we know when its an urgent matter and press forward with the priorities… hurry up and get this done! So why not atm to counterpoint that? A nice quiet, unobtrusive, lower-case acronym that keeps us rooted in the present: s-l-o-w d-o-w-n… The present is really all we have: all I really know is here and now, where everything is alright at the moment.

Richard Rohr says, “Prayer lives in pure open moments of right here, right now. This is enough, this is fullness. If it is not right here, right now, it doesn’t exist. If we don’t know God now, why would we know God later? It is a matter of seeing God now, through the shadow and disguise”

This is becoming my spiritual practise, atm. It’s the old Brother Lawrence ‘Practising the Presence of God’, living with Him at all times – at this time. And this. And now. And here is I AM again, as I simply stop and focus on His reassuring peace in my heart and breathe out gratitide for Her unconditional Love.

Well, the world is full of jargon, depending on one’s field.How many people know what DNA stands for (DeoxyriboNucleic Acid) or that BMW stands for Bavarian Motor Works?! Or that a url is a uniform resource locator and http stands for hypertext transfer protocol? We may complain about it, and sometimes feel excluded by it, but it doesn’t stop us using it!

So even if atm doesn’t catch on, please forgive me if I accidentally use it occasionally as I try to live life moment to moment at the moment 🙂

One Response to …at the moment

Hope you have a lovely time on the Isles of scilly.
I understand totally how much you need a break and sometimes you have to just decide to go! However, it makes your stomach churn at thinking about all the things and people you have to leave behind even for a few days,
when they all rely on you!
I will be thinking and praying for you all! So glad that Becka is doing well!
Lots of love to you all
Mary